Chapter 47
Yu Zhi’s expression shifted noticeably, and even someone as oblivious as Lin Xiangyuan could pick up on it.
From the look of things, Yu Zhi seemed to have some sort of connection with the new Minister—perhaps even a deep one.
Lin Xiangyuan, knowing Yu Zhi’s name was Yu You, started speculating. One was named Yu You, the other Yu Yi. Could they be brothers?
Dr. Qi also noticed Yu Zhi’s odd reaction. With the new Minister yet to arrive and a person standing before him who seemed to know the Minister, his curiosity burned bright. “What’s your relationship with him?”
Yu Zhi opened his eyes wearily, meeting the fiery, gossip-hungry gazes of the two men.
“…”
If he said he had a grudge against Fu Suxi, they’d probably hand him over immediately. After all, this was the Special Operation Bureau; there was no way they’d side with a stranger over the newly appointed Minister sent by headquarters.
But if he denied the grudge and left things vague, the fact that Fu Suxi had chosen to use a surname like “Yu” would only fuel their wild guesses.
In a flash, Yu Zhi made a decision.
He lowered his gaze and let out a bitter chuckle. “The relationship between us…”
Lin Xiangyuan and Dr. Qi exchanged a glance, thinking the same thing: this guy’s relationship with the new Minister must be anything but ordinary.
Yu Zhi discreetly pinched his leg wound, his voice raspy with feigned emotion. “We… we…”
His tone quavered slightly, his lashes trembling as though struggling with something unspeakable.
His lips parted, then pressed shut again, before he finally said slowly, “I do know him.”
“But a lot has happened between us. It’s so complicated I don’t even know how to properly describe our relationship.”
Lin Xiangyuan froze. Complicated?
Weren’t they just brothers?
He wanted to gossip with Dr. Qi, but the observation room was small. With Yu Zhi right there, it wasn’t the place for it. Reluctantly, he swallowed his questions.
Dr. Qi glanced at the monitor displaying increasingly abnormal blood pressure and heart rate readings. His sense of duty as a doctor outweighed his curiosity. “Alright, no need to stress about it. Rest and recover first.”
Yu Zhi exhaled slowly, continuing his half-true, half-false story. “Although he looks decent on the surface, his temper is terrible. He has no sense of moderation in anything he does.”
“I was originally planning to go to B City from H City to find him, but I accidentally stumbled into a dungeon along the way,” he said, grimacing in feigned pain. “Now I’m hurt like this. I’m worried he’ll get angry when he sees me.”
Dr. Qi nodded knowingly. “I did hear from Shang Yu that the new Minister has quite the temper.”
Lin Xiangyuan looked at Yu Zhi, then at his injury-ridden body.
Yu Zhi had helped the Bureau eliminate a pollution source, ensured Zuo Feiyang’s survival, and now turned out to be someone who knew the new Minister.
After some thought, Lin Xiangyuan offered, “Don’t worry, both Old Qi and I are tight-lipped. We won’t spread your story around.”
“I’ll go check in with Zuo Feiyang later and get his full report on the Taijiang Town pollution source.”
Yu Zhi smiled faintly. “Thanks.”
He didn’t need Lin Xiangyuan or Dr. Qi to keep the matter under wraps for long. As long as they didn’t immediately inform Fu Suxi, he’d be grateful.
It wasn’t about mistrust; he simply knew Fu Suxi would inevitably find him.
Nearly an hour had passed, and Fu Suxi still hadn’t returned to the Bureau. This meant he didn’t know Yu Zhi was there and was likely searching elsewhere.
If he could delay another hour, he’d have more time to come up with a countermeasure.
Just as Yu Zhi was deep in thought, he suddenly felt his right arm lifted.
Instinctively, he looked over to see Dr. Qi inspecting the wound on his arm with a frown. “This injury is strange. I’ve been using my ability for a while, and it’s barely improved.”
The wound on his right hand was still gruesome—raw flesh exposed from the wrist to the mid-forearm, with muscle fibers visible and faint bite marks discernible.
“What bit you?” Dr. Qi asked.
Yu Zhi answered honestly, “A pollution source.”
Dr. Qi looked surprised. “You’ve got some serious luck. Bitten this badly by a pollution source, yet you’re neither contaminated nor dead.”
Yu Zhi nodded in agreement. “Fate has other plans for me.”
Dr. Qi: “…”
After a brief silence, Dr. Qi re-bandaged the wound and explained, “Injuries caused by parasitic pollution sources are typically hard to treat. We’ve ruled out parasitic contamination.”
“And ability-users usually heal better due to their physical constitution, but your healing progress is unusually poor. I’m not sure if that’s due to the pollution source or your own body.”
“For now, we’ll treat it slowly,” he said, turning to Lin Xiangyuan. “Are you heading to the research lab to find Zuo Feiyang? Bring me a copy of their pollution report while you’re at it. I want to see if there’s a connection to the pollution source.”
Lin Xiangyuan stood up. “Got it.”
Yu Zhi asked, “Can I come along? I want to check on Xiao Zuo and Xiao Ming.”
Dr. Qi immediately objected. “Don’t push yourself. Besides, you won’t be allowed to see them. Mental contamination cases are isolated for treatment and can’t be visited casually.”
“Exactly. Wait until you’re better,” Lin Xiangyuan added before striding out of the observation room.
Left with no choice, Yu Zhi lay back on the bed, closing his eyes to rest while brainstorming countermeasures.
*
At 6 p.m., streetlights along the roads automatically flickered on.
Fu Suxi leaned against a desk, the glow of his cigarette casting fleeting shadows over his face as smoke curled upward.
He took a drag, his gaze cutting through the haze to rest on the faintly reflective surface of the towering walls in the distance.
Suddenly, he spoke. “Who ordered these two walls built?”
Shang Yu was momentarily stunned before replying, “The Central Command at headquarters.”
Fu Suxi continued, “When was this?”
Shang Yu thought for a moment. “The directive came early in the morning on the 17th, along with the solution for Main Mission Two. By midday, the Espers dispatched by headquarters had arrived and finished constructing the walls that afternoon.”
An afternoon? Fu Suxi’s brows lifted slightly. “What are the names of the dispatched personnel? Where did the building materials come from?”
Shang Yu was stumped. She turned to look at the team members behind her.
The team members glanced at each other, shaking their heads one by one.
Shang Yu had no choice but to say, “I’m not sure, but I can get you the full report once we’re back at the Bureau.”
Fu Suxi responded indifferently, his tone casual.
Not long after, a group of people ran out of the testing building.
“Minister Yu, we’ve searched everywhere and confirmed that the two people in the photos are not in the hospital. There’s no sign of them in the surveillance records either.”
Fu Suxi exhaled a ring of smoke.
Through the haze, Shang Yu felt the icy chill of his gaze falling on her.
She tentatively suggested, “Is it possible that they’re—” not here?
Before she could finish, Fu Suxi interrupted, “They’re in S City.”
Shang Yu knew he must have used some method to confirm this. She tried another angle, “Could they be dead?”
One of the team members immediately responded, “We’ve already checked with the morgue and crematorium staff—nothing.”
Shang Yu frowned. “So they made it inside the walls alive?”
“That’s impossible. The two layers of walls are alarmed. Any unauthorized entry outside the gates would trigger an alert. Could it be some special ability…?”
Fu Suxi’s gaze casually swept toward the gate ahead, where a young couple was being escorted over by soldiers guarding the first wall.
“Ability-users from the Bureau don’t need testing?”
Shang Yu nodded. “Correct, but no new ability-users have arrived at the Bureau in the past two days—”
Her words halted abruptly as a thought struck her.
Fu Suxi turned his eyes to her.
Shang Yu quickly said, “When we left earlier, we encountered a group returning after clearing a pollution source. I saw Lin Baldy—uh, Captain Lin—had strangers in his car.”
Just as she finished, the two soldiers escorting the young couple reached them.
Fu Suxi extinguished his cigarette and looked at the couple, whose faces were pale with fear. “Where are you from?”
The man stammered nervously, “F-From H City.”
As soon as he finished, a black longsword appeared in Fu Suxi’s hand.
Before anyone could react, he cleanly sliced off the man’s head as if cutting a watermelon, blood splattering everywhere.
The woman, clutching the man’s arm, froze for a second before letting out a piercing scream. “AAAAHHH—”
Her head hit the ground a moment later.
Shang Yu’s face turned pale. “Minister Yu!”
But before she could say more, she noticed cockroaches crawling out of the severed heads.
Before their antennae could touch the ground, they were incinerated by flames, reduced to ash.
Shang Yu’s eyes widened slightly. Parasitic pollutants.
She looked at Fu Suxi with a hint of surprise. “Minister Yu, how did you—” know?
Fu Suxi retracted his longsword and removed his glasses, nonchalantly wiping the blood off the lenses.
“Anyone from H City should be tested individually.”
Without offering any explanation, he issued a second command: “Back to the Bureau.”
*
Observation Room.
Yu Zhi lay on his side on the hospital bed, his back to Dr. Qi.
The two had just exchanged names, and upon learning that Yu Zhi also had the surname “Yu,” Dr. Qi’s gaze had grown particularly meaningful.
Yu Zhi pretended not to notice, focusing instead on devising a plan for dealing with Fu Suxi’s impending arrival.
The only card he had to play was his knowledge of Meteor Biotechnology’s clues.
But knowing Fu Suxi’s personality, he wouldn’t care about those clues. Worse, it might make him even more determined to kill Yu Zhi.
Should he try contacting headquarters in B City? That man Ji Yin seemed to want him alive, but this was S City, and Fu Suxi was operating under the guise of a Minister. With the distance to headquarters, the situation felt hopeless.
Yu Zhi envisioned various escape plans, but none of them had more than a 50% chance of success.
Rounded down, that was as good as certain death.
The only gamble he had left was a blind box item.
Yu Zhi desperately hoped to draw something capable of countering Fu Suxi, but his luck was atrocious. The lucky Lu Liming wasn’t around to share his good fortune.
Should he open it or not?
What if it turned out to be junk?
Boom—
A flash of lightning illuminated the dark sky, followed by a thunderclap that shook the air.
Dr. Qi closed the window and glanced outside. “Looks like it’s about to pour. The new Minister should be back soon.”
Yu Zhi shut his eyes briefly. No time left.
Taking a deep breath, he steeled himself and said to the system: [System, open the blind box.]
A delicate gift box appeared on the translucent panel. The lid lifted, and a card popped out.
[Item: Unstoppable Resolve (Ability-Type)]
[Function: Costs 100 universal currency per minute of activation.]
[Description: Life is tough for men—hardships abound, and staying ‘hard’ is an unsung battle. Trust us with your needs, and we’ll deliver vitality in return. Unstoppable Resolve: Absolute firmness wherever you want it, however you need it. Stay strong, live long, and enjoy a robust life of fulfillment!]
Yu Zhi: “!!”
For the first time in his life, he found the absurdly cheesy descriptions on JJ Literature City shining with brilliance, dazzling and glorious.
He, Yu Zhi, would become a healthy man!
